just as infection numbers were starting
to decline in germany
variant strains of covert 19 believed to
be more contagious
could undo all the hard work there have
been isolated cases of some strains and
authorities
want to get on top of the threat
the scientists tell us that it's not yet
dominant
there's still some time to contain the
dangers
of course it would be wrong to conclude
from that that we still have all the
time in the world to act
so just over a month into germany's
latest lockdown
the chancellor and the 16 state premiers
agreed to extend existing measures
until mid-february large parts of public
life will remain closed
like schools and day care centres but
also
shops museums theatres and restaurants
there'll be a lot more of these to be
seen medical masks will be compulsory on
public transport and in
shops the so-called ffp2 masks offer
greater protection
but common surgical masks will also be
allowed
and there's to be much more working from
home the government's imposing stricter
rules to stop
office workers from commuting as much
reducing the infection risk on public
transport
germany's leaders are once again
appealing for patience
it's hard what we are asking of people
is hard
but the priority must be protection that
is what we have to take into account and
that is what we have taken into account
today
for now the public is mostly on side
recent polling shows 40
are happy with stricter measures while
just over 20
would prefer things to stay as they are
but around a third want restrictions to
be eased
or to end completely
before that happens there's likely to be
some hard weeks ahead
infection rates are still nearly three
times the preferred level
but with patience persistence and
sticking to the rules
authorities hope the pandemic will start
to loosen its grip
on germany let's bring in our political
correspondent nina hasa here nina
what's the strategy behind these new
measures
angela merkel is a scientist so she
believes when scientists tell her that
we could
face an even greater threat from those
new
variants that are coming in from other
countries
and so it was very clear from the
beginning that the current restrictions
would be extended
for as long as possible and under german
law that is for weeks so
that brings us to mid-february and the
idea of course is that
a sudden new spike in numbers has to be
prevented
under all counts and that we will
hopefully have more information on the
new variants by then
the current restrictions are already
quite strict large parts of public life
have been
shut since november but the numbers are
not going down
quite as much as they need to be and so
now the idea is
to focus more on the work sphere and not
just on the private sphere because there
are very
big limitations on who how many people
you can meet in private
but people the politicians are saying
that still too many people
go to the offices when that is not
absolutely necessary
and that means that trains and buses are
quite full so more infections
potentially and so
now that is why they've introduced this
obligation to wear medical masks
to um prevent infections where people do
meet and they're forcing companies
to have their people work from home
wherever that is possible
the need for further action nina was
clear long before the chancellor in
state premieres gathered yet it took
them
hours and hours to agree on the new
rules why
well the key sticking point was whether
or not to introduce
or to um yeah to keep schools and
kindergarten
shut and extend the measures for them as
well or to keep them shut for a longer
period and that was of course a debate
about the right balance between
opening them because children have a
right to education here in germany
and there's a lot of pressure on parents
at the moment who are essentially having
to teach their kids at home
and on the other hand the data that
scientists are giving us
whether warning that them the
information that they have seemed to
suggest that the new variants of the
virus are a lot more transmissible also
amongst children and young people and so
angela merkel wanted to keep those
schools shut until the numbers would
have gone down a lot more significantly
but there was a lot of resistance from
some social democratic leaders of
regions who said that the schools must
be given a perspective to open again
nina thank you so much dw's political
correspondent nina haza there
here's a look at some other developments
in the corona virus pandemic worldwide
the world health organization says the
more contagious uk
variant has now been detected in at
least 60 countries
that's 10 more than a week ago
authorities in beijing
have imposed a lockdown on five
neighborhoods after the city reported a
handful of new cases
china reported 103 new cases countrywide
and the number of cases linked to the
australian open tennis tournament
in australia has risen to 10 after two
players and a support person tested
positive for the virus
a total of 72 players remain under
strict quarantine
you